Time is Just Another Number
by SerialStoryLover
Summary: Because Time does not heal all wounds. But that does not mean that other things can't. Set after season 1. Will/Mackenzie


_**This is dedicated to Millie Zhang, who has been amazingly enthusiastic and supportive and always makes me feel really guilty for not being able to update my other stories so often. Millie, I promise I'm working on it.**_

_**Also, I think I've done another story about this literally a week ago, but something lilacmermaid33 and I were saying prompted me to write this. **_

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Mackenzie looked up in slight surprise as Will burst into her office, no knocking, not even a verbal signal – he just barged in. What she found even stranger, however, was that she had suspected (given the evidence) to find some sort of anger or annoyance in his eyes; instead all she was met with was a strange, undetectable look which might have been fear.

"Will?" She asked uncertainly, rising slightly from her seat. He looked at her curiously for a moment as the door swung shut behind him, before holding out his hand to her.

"Stand up." She was utterly confused. She had absolutely no idea where this was coming from, or indeed, where the hell it was going. She just furrowed her eyebrows, shooting a questioning look at him.

"Why?"

"Please, just do this for me." Will still had that strange, indescribable look on his face – a look she had definitely never seen before. Feeling slightly nervous, Mac got up from behind her desk and walked cautiously to stand facing him as he captured her hand gently in his, pulling her towards him.

Their toes were millimetres apart and Will was looking deeply into her eyes.

"Do you trust me?" Will asked in a low, hoarse voice. Mac's eyes widened – what on earth could this be about? Will was positively anxious and she had no idea what this was about; she knew her answer though.

"Yes, of course." There seemed to be a flash of pain behind Will's eyes before he looked downwards and gulped slightly. Mac leaned in slightly, searching his eyes – or trying to.

Before she knew what was happening next, Will was slowly, and in silence, undoing the buttons on her shirt, starting just below her breasts and moving down the way, beginning to pull her shirt out from her waistband as he ran out of buttons which he had access to.

Mackenzie's gaze suddenly focused and she looked intensely, anxiously at Will, grabbing hold of his upper arms to steady herself. His looked up, still working on her shirt, and gave her a reassuring look. It didn't help much, and she just gazed warily back at him. His face fell and he leaned in placing a very gently, lingering kiss on her forehead.

His lips were just as soft and warm as she remembered; and though she was worried about what was about to happen, the crease on her forehead instantly relaxed as she found herself leaning into his touch, her eyes closing automatically. She was sad when his lips finally left, although their connection returned almost instantly as he leaned his forehead against hers, breathing shallowly. She opened her eyes and saw the expression change on his face. Deciding she did not want to watch this, she promptly closed them again.

As he finished with her buttons, Will's hands moved gently to rest on her hips as he surveyed the scene before him. She felt rather than saw the reactions he was having. The quick intake of breath as he saw it clearly, the feather-light tracing of his finger over her phantom, the feeling of him sinking down into the chair behind him so that he could see it better in the light, his hands still holding her hips.

After a moment of quiet, he pulled her forward gently and to her complete surprise, the next thing she felt was his lips press gently to her scar. She let out a small gasp and quickly looked down.

Sure enough, Will's mouth was resting gently on her abdomen and she could feel the wetness of a tear sliding down his face where his chin met her stomach. She knew she was a little thinner than when he had last seen her body exposed. Knew that if he were to explore further, then he would find a few more additions to the graphology of her anatomy, and it made her even more desperate to cover herself up before he got any ideas. But equally, she knew that she could not.

He was hurting because she had not come to tell him this before the footage had been released. She had always figured that he had known about Islamabad – and he had; but he had never seen what had actually unfolded, and she had never, ever mentioned it to him. It had gone unspoken and unacknowledged between them.

But two hours ago, reporters at CNN had released newly discovered footage that a crew had discovered at an old house she and her team had once used whilst they had been sheltering from some anti-Western protests when they were in Islamabad a few years back. The house had belonged to a friendly, old Pakistani couple who had sheltered them in the upstairs bedroom for a couple of weeks and who had obviously continued their generosity to the News Network when a new team of reporters arrived in the city a month or so ago. Mackenzie had assumed the couple would just have dumped their left belongings…apparently not.

She knew that had it been reversed, she too would have released the footage – the way some countries treat journalists should definitely be reported (though no journalist ever wants to be the story), but she had a sneaking suspicion that Jim had hidden the camera reel in the room so that the others could not send it on and then he had just forgotten about it.

Jo Riley, the EP who was running the story – and who was an old friend and colleague of hers – had called her last night and explained what they were planning to do. She had been dreading telling Will all day, and in the end had not mustered the courage to do it in time.

Though she fully accepted that it was her cheating which had driven them apart and sent her to Afghanistan, it had been clear to her when she got back that although he had never replied to her emails, he had worried about her – of course he had; he loved her. And so she knew that regardless of "the facts", Will would blame himself for what he had clearly just seen on national TV. This was why they had never mentioned it to each other beforehand.

Now that she came to think of it, she didn't actually know what was on the footage herself – she could barely remember it. She clearly remembered the actual stabbing – it was basically just two minutes of excruciating pain before one of the crew got to her (Jim, if she recalled correctly) and shoved her attacker away towards where two ISAF soldiers were waiting. The blade coming out had actually been more painful than when it had gone in. After that, however, it was all a drowsy blur. She knew she had lost a lot of blood which had resulted in a steady loss of consciousness. She only had others' reports – which she hadn't really listened to; it was not something she had really wanted any more vivid a picture of – of how she actually got to the hospital.

Oh God. It was all coming flooding back. The protest, looking up into the tangle of legs as she fell to the ground, Jim's panicked, terrified face, waking up in hospital…

She snapped out of her reverie to find Will looking balefully up at her. They gazed at each other for a moment, before Will looked back at her scar, tightening his grip on her as he kissed it again, and then slowly working his way upwards as far as her open shirt would allow.

She was lost for words as his lips jumped to the exposed slice of her collarbone as he stood up, pulling her into his arms; meandering up her neck, to her hairline, down her cheek, to the corner of her mouth…

"What are you doing?" She whispered, searching his eyes, confused. He recognised what she was feeling and moved one hand to her face, tucking the hair behind her ear and once more leaning his forehead against hers, his eyes blazing into hers.

"What I would have done if I could have been there. Whatever's happened before…the thought of losing you…of you not being somewhere on this planet…" His voice choked as he blinked back the emotion. She realised that he was just as confused as he was, but that this was all just instinctive – and she was totally mesmerised. He gave her a couple of seconds to stop him before he pressed his mouth passionately to hers.

She grabbed his shirt, pulling him even closer to her, leaning into him. They might not be in this position again for a while, or maybe never; so she was going to memorise every second and every movement.

His fingers gently caressed her cheek, and his other hand slid to the small of her back, copying her move to bring them closer together. It was passionate, but it was also slow and sweet; not a glad-to-be-alive or full-of-longing kiss, but rather the emotions of two people who, whether they are successful at it or not, are soulmates.

She kissed him in return with an intensity equal to his own, her hands moving from his arms to his neck and his hair, her fingers running through it lovingly.

His tongue brushed her lower lip and she immediately opened her mouth to him – it somehow made her feel like they had actually moved even closer together – which was impossible; there was absolutely no room for air between them. Yet as their tongues entwined, Mackenzie lost track of where she ended and where Will began.

She jumped slightly as the hand on her back moved under her shirt and round to her scar, gently running over it soothingly. Instead of putting her off, or making her pull away, she merely pressed herself harder to him, lifting herself off her feet slightly.

When they eventually broke apart (neither of them had kept a track of time – it might have been one minute of five, though surely the latter), they still stood in a close embrace. Mackenzie had not noticed the tears which had appeared on her face, and Will now gently wiped them away with his thumb.

"I wish you _had_ been there." She said quietly, trying to get her breath back. Again, she saw the flash of pain flash across his face, and she finally realised it for what it was: regret.

"I wish you _hadn't_ been there."

Not wanting him to get too wrapped in what-ifs, she gently pressed another kiss to his mouth, reassuring him that it was absolutely not his fault. He returned it before slowly moving his hands downwards to begin redoing her shirt.

She longed for this moment not to end, and showed him so by gently tightening her arms around him and laying her head against his cheek, kissing his neck gently. She had not lied. She wished more than anything that she could have held Will this way after she had been stabbed. Although she had been surrounded by her amazing, incredible crew, she had felt so _alone_ – even more so than usual, without him.

Mackenzie allowed her eyes to close, just letting herself imagine that the darkness which engulfed her was actually just the two of them standing alone in space, untouchable and together. But it was too short-lived for her liking. She may have had her eyes shut, but she could feel Will gently tucking her shirt into her waistband once more. She chose not to open her eyes and make the moment last for as long as possible.

His hands lingered at her waist for a moment when he had finished his task, and she stood, frozen, waiting for the moment when he would end their temporary truce and they would have to leave this office as they had been when they entered it: once more riddled with doubt and confusion. He pulled her into his arms one last time, burying his face deep into the side of her neck as though he was trying to remember the smell of her from an old memory.

Mac melted into him, holding him close and absent-mindedly running a finger along the length of his shoulders as he pressed herself to him, savouring his warmth, his touch, his smell, his heartbeat steadily pumping out a rhythm beneath her skin.

She didn't think she had felt so alive, yet so in limbo, in a long, long time.

All too soon, he was pulling back gently; though not simply detaching himself. He tried to speak and failed, so she forced a smile and shook her head, telling him it was okay – but she had to bite her lip to stop it from wobbling. He returned a grateful look and pressed a final kiss to her forehead before gently releasing his hold on her arms and heading for the door, letting his hand run the length of her arm to keep the contact going as long as possible.

Only once the door closed again did she allow her eyes to close once more and let the scene replay itself behind her eyes a couple of times, replacing the images of her stabbing which had been intruding on her thoughts all day. She felt a small smile pull at the edges of her mouth.

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_**Okay let me explain:**_

_**I know that I have about 4 stories which all need updates, "So why are you posting something which is not one of these stories?" I hear you scream, frustrated. Well, it's an attempt to get over writer's block. And it is steadily working. I promise! I'm probably more frustrated than you :p**_

_**There are currently new chapters in progress for Sins of the Daughter (3 chapters, actually), The Real Don Quixote, and In the Bleak Midwinter. I'll get them up as soon as I can; but in the meantime I figured that I may as well post whatever else I end up writing to try and get over my strange obstruction to my other stories.**_

_**Please be patient and stick with me, I love you all for the support you've given so far. I can't believe I only started doing this like a month ago. **_

_**A xx**_


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